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FLOOD WITHOUT WATER: INURING {Flash Fiction Contest w/R.K. Brainerd}

HAPPY HOLIDAYS!This week's post features another GH flash fiction entry!If you've been reading for long, you know the rules: Each author does a flash fiction piece, 2500 words, using five key words chosen for them by Carrie. When all the authors have been posted, we will have a reader poll to see whose was best. (Mary, George, and Linda have already posted in earlier blogs.)This week, R. K. Brainerd starts us off with a wonderful and completely original fantasy story. We don't want to make any bets, but we THINK this might become a series--if we play our cards right. Remember that once all the authors have posted, we'll be holding a vote about which story was best, so if this one fits the bill, mark it down!R.K.'s words were:

Assemblage, Brood, Inure, Labyrinthine, and Nemesis

Flood Without Water: Inuring

by R.K. Brainerd

Sofija
placed her hands on her thighs and let her hips relax. The movement of Arklys’
steps beneath her, subtle as they were, gently rocked her. It was best to put
on a picture of ease, he’d told her.

A
picture of ease. On the back of a razor-toothed devil horse. Meeting more
razor-toothed creatures straight from the molten core of the planet.

If only
her mother could see her now.

Arklys
sent a soft feeling of comfort, but he was too distracted to really make it
stick. She could feel the attention it was taking for him to remember the
pathway through this place. A Labyrinthine, he called it. A gateway to a part of the
world he came from. Each of his hooves had to be placed exactly right. Something
about the ground needing to recognize him, and him having to plod out the
correct sequence and placement of steps. There was only one path forward—but it
led to nowhere if you traversed it incorrectly.

In Sofija’s home, a labyrinthine was a
place of meditation and inner reflection. She didn’t know what to think about Arklys’
use of it … or which use had come first. She was still struggling to understand
that humanity had made a pact with Gaia millennia ago, that daemon traditions existed in every civilization
across the globe … and that they were now here to wipe out humanity for
breaking their oath to take care of the earth.

The sky was starting to shift, the
changing colors shining more vividly, the stars seeming to brighten until it
hurt to look at them. The clouds were gone; constellations cut giant swaths
across the sky, bringing an odd order to the black and green and blue.

Arklys’ sleek black hide made more sense
here—an odd connection Sofija never would have guessed at had she not seen it. She
stroked his back—almost a compulsion to prove he was still physical, despite
the obvious reality that she sat upon him. Breaking his concentration, his head
twisted towards her. He rubbed his nose along her shin once, twice, and then
returned to his task.

They were meeting at a place halfway
between. Whatever that meant.

She startled as Arklys answered the
question in her head before she’d even asked it. Yes, I’m sure they won’t kill us. At least not immediately.

“Why
now?” she murmured. “We’ve been trying to avoid them for months, and now they want to talk peace?”

Arklys didn’t respond, which was typical.
He hadn’t been answering similar questions since he’d announced yesterday that ‘they’
wanted to meet with them. And the knot in Sofija’s gut wouldn’t dissipate. He
could be leading her to her death, sick of her whiny wanting to go home. Or
meeting his kind so he could go back to them, fed up with her warped sense of
humor.

He was the only thing Sofija knew she had
left.

Arklys sent the feeling of warmth again.
She was not comforted. All she wanted to do was go home. But she’d never make
it there alive without him … and they couldn’t go back north without first
being sure they weren’t followed. He had promised her he’d take her back home
without leading his people to her doorstep.

That was, if her home wasn’t completely
obliterated.

Suddenly Arklys’ ears pricked and he
glided into a trot. She no longer flinched at how smoothly he moved, as if he
were made of shadow instead of substance. She did still get dizzy if she
watched him for too long, though, his joints and body moving in ways that were
too different.

Now she looked down at the ground, which reflected
her own image. Her features, the color of her hair … it all seemed flat and
plain in this place.

Then shadows began to take form and the
hair on her neck stood up. Burning-coal eyes appeared as creatures showed
themselves along their path. Their shapes were too different to make sense of
them, their sleek black coats a mirror of Arklys. Only none of them had Arklys’
grace and bizarre mix of equine and feline.

The creatures grew more numerous as the
path straightened and then turned into a vast shallow bowl-shaped valley that
seemed to encompass the sky and the earth all in one.

Within that bowl, half a dozen humanoid
creatures stood watching Arklys and Sofija approach. She recognized two of them
instantly—or maybe Arklys did—despite their uniform jagged-yet-sleek armor…
which could have been armor or simply their bodies.

The daemons,
humanity called them. Or the fae, if someone remembered the old stories. The
last time she’d seen the one on the right, she’d driven a crappy, rusty sword
through him and into the ground.

Shoulder
is looking well, she
thought, somewhere between sniggering and fleeing in terror.

Arklys came to a halt. He wanted her to
get off him. Sofija hesitated, but listened. She remained close, though; close
enough to feel the damp heat he radiated.

One of the daemons stepped forward, and she knew that one too. She was there
the first time Sofija and Arklys had faced them. She began to speak, and for a
second it was nothing but gibberish. Then it clicked, and Sofija felt like her brain was being twisted, pulled
in ways it wasn’t supposed to go. She cringed, no less than the last time this
had happened.

“… Prince-ride…
it is a pleasure to see you again… looking much better this time…”

Sofija knew that was a dig at her. Arklys
had not looked good the last time they’d faced each other. It was right after
she’d accidentally killed Arklys’ prince and gained his loyalty … and she
hadn’t known what to feed him. They hadn’t been able to communicate yet, either;
she hadn’t even known they could
communicate. He’d been withering away.

“… Though
your familiar looks a little sick… She’s not dying is she?...”

Arklys snorted. Mine is none of your concern

That seemed to make her ripple with
amusement. “… She is not cut out for you…”

Arklys’ ears flipped back against his head.

“…
It is time to come home… The next brood will be coming soon… It
is your duty to create the next…”

Arklys seemed to relax. His head tilted in
a decidedly non-equine movement, his lips pulling back from his wicked razor
teeth in a grin. They gleamed like stars in this place.

Is
that what this is? The next brood is no longer my problem. As you can see—

The voice began to croon. “… You are the best of us… We will be lesser
without you…”

Technically, daemon steeds, like Arklys, were subservient. Or more accurately,
they were subservient when they were paired with the ‘princes.’ This leadership
class apparently had no status without a steed. The power of the steed helped
determine the status of the ‘prince.’ There was also something to do with
bloodline, but Arklys was more evasive with that.

Sofija didn’t really know how it worked, and
Arklys had not been the most patient about explaining. Really, all she knew was
that the daemons were pissed that
she’d killed Arklys’ first prince. Not necessarily because of his death, but
because of the loss of Arklys’ loyalty. And somehow … because Sofija was not a daemon and not within their hierarchy, Arklys’
standing was as if he wasn’t paired, which meant that he had more status than
most daemons, leadership class
included. Sofija guessed he’d been powerful even before, but now he was even more.

She did wonder if that was part of the
reason he stuck with her.

“… You cannot
think to be Inure with her…” the voice said, soothing and
condescending.

Sofija hadn’t heard that one before. She
wracked her brain to even understand what the word meant. It was something
having to do with becoming used to something, particularly violence. But that
didn’t bring any clarity to what the daemon
was saying.

Arklys shifted, and Sofija put her hand
out automatically against his withers. It was a habit, this understanding what
he wanted.

“… YOU ALREADY HAVE…” the daemon bellowed.

Sofija’s mouth filled with metal. She was
suddenly back in the fort at the Green Isles, liquid black horrors flying at
the walls and dragging screaming soldiers over the edge to never be seen from
again—not even their bodies.

“… This is too far. THIS CANNOT STAND…”

And
time to go.

Arklys crouched abruptly into an equine
bow that was too fluid to be real and his air of calm slammed into Sofija’s
chest, just as easily as all the other times he’d done it. She’d barely got a
hold of his mane before he wheeled around, so quickly that the stars blurred
into a circle of light above her head.

We
must go before they bring my Nemesis.

He’d spoken of a Nemesis before. Each daemon had one; if one got too powerful,
there was always another who knew their weakness, who was able to take them
out. He’d mentioned once, in the dark of the woods weeks ago, that he’d been
nervous the daemons would send his
after him.

Now he lunged back the way they’d come. It
was a bizarre few seconds as she realized he was laughing—a terrible, mocking laugh that echoed in her head like
giant bells. And despite the complete and utter creepiness of the devil-horse, she
wasn’t having the the flashbacks of living through hell every night at the
Green Isles, like she did with the other daemons.
It brought her back to the here and now, which, actually, was helpful.

You
should know…

Arkyls’ voice in her head was still
dripping with dark humor. He was then leaping
across the spiral path instead of following it, his hooves striking directly in
the center of each stone before he lunged to the next. Each connection sent up
sparks, like pops of fire, and Sofija could feel the rippling physical power he
was exuding. It was making her more nauseous than she already was.

What
I’m doing with you isn’t exactly allowed…

“Having a human as your … pair?” Sofija
gasped as a daemon went flying by her
head, missing her by a hair when she ducked and Arklys swerved. “They didn’t seem
so angry last time.”

I
mean when you feel me… It’s—

Arklys suddenly wheeled and let out a
howling scream, and Sofija was nearly flung off of him as he struck something
that had been rocketing toward them. Metal tang hit her nose a second later. Her
eyes shut tightly and she twisted her head away, her stomach churning. Inured
to violence she was not, whatever the daemon
had meant.

Her people never acted in violence. Only
for defense, if necessary. It was probably why there were so few left. But it
didn’t stop the wrongness she felt—despite
the months of killing to survive.

Her eyes opened, and her stomach dropped.
A great flood of daemons was
burgeoning toward them, following the path of the labyrinthine. They were hazy,
almost more mist than physical. But as they grew closer, they grew darker. And
more real.

Was
this the last thing my family saw, too?

Panic had her hitting Arklys in the neck
with her closed fist. Arklys twisted, done with his victim, and surged into a
gallop again. He wasn’t leaping over the paths anymore, but now racing through
the circular pattern of the labyrinthine.

It
would be dangerous to skip earth-paths at this point.

Again, he answered a question she hadn’t
even asked. He was doing that more and more lately. As if he were always inside
her head.

Suddenly something whizzed past her ear
and Arklys stumbled, a black shiny arrow embedded in his shoulder. He
immediately righted and was running again.

“Arklys!”

I
am not hurt.

“’I am not hurt,’” Sofija mocked.

This reaction was a lot more extreme than
last time. Previously, the daemons
had challenged her for Arklys’ loyalty. When she’d won anyway—because of
Arklys’ influence, mind you—they’d threatened that they’d challenge her again
in the future.

She thought a question to Arklys—intentionally
this time: The daemons challenged me for you before. Why are they
attacking instead?

You
don’t have to think so hard, and it is because if I truly Inure with you, you
will have status as a daemon.

Sofija’s mind blanked.

Yes,
they’d rather kill us both than have that happen.

“That’s ridiculous! I don’t want status!” How is that possible? I just want to go home!

I
know, Arklys soothed. I will take you home. I promised before,
I’ll promise again.

The pressure of the air changed, then, Sofija’s
ears popped, and she blinked as the colors of the world shifted. They were
almost to the end of the labyrinthine … the daemons
hot on their heels.

What
is Inure?

Not
right now

“Yes, right now!”

And then, she just knew—whether it came
from him or herself, it didn’t really matter. ‘Inure’ meant becoming accustomed
to something—or something taking effect. It was what had been happening between
them: the learning to communicate, the knowing what the other wanted without
speaking, the bizarre urges Sofija’d had since she killed Arklys’ previous ‘prince.’

He’d accepted her as his ‘pair,’ devoting
his life and soul to being her constant companion and protection. A spell—or
more seemingly, a physiological change—was happening to both of them,
conditioning them to each other. While a normal part of daemon adulthood, it was taking an extra step with Sofija, the
human. Arklys saw it as normal; he saw it as pleasing.